Robert Caro Quotes

We're taught Lord Acton's axiom: all power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. I believed that when I started these books, but I don't believe it's always true any more. Power doesn't always corrupt. Power can cleanse. What I believe is always true about power is that power always reveals.

Divine right went out with the American Revolution and doesn't belong to the White House aides. What meat do they eat that makes them grow so great?

Towering over Presidents and State Governors, over Congress and State Legislatures, over conventions and the vast machinery of party, public opinion stands out in the United States, as the great source of Power.

No man ever exercised less influence in the Senate or the House of Representatives than he, but no man ever exercised more power as a political leader.

To be frank, politics is about wanting power, getting it, exercising it, and keeping it.

Dictators never invent their own opportunities.

They all want to be me. They do! What everybody else says they will do, I've already been doing. They all want to be me. It's become a joke in Congress how Dr. Gingrey and Mr. Kingston have been following my votes. They've even changed votes to what I voted, multiple times. Members of Congress are laughing about it.

The first lady must be a leader. She must not be a follower.

Politicians are there to try to deal with stuff, but sometimes it's both fortunate and unfortunate that people like us have more... not involvement, but more power in the stuff that we say.

Politics and power is a realm of relative influence.

To be able to endure odium is the first art to be learned by those who aspire to power.

I think I can regard myself as a political decision-maker.

Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely, and I found that out when I was Attorney General in Massachusetts.

In America, public opinion is the leader.

Politics is activity in relation to power.

I think political people are afraid of me.

Well, I have an interest in power. I have an interest in people who find themselves in the position to exercise absolute power.

I want to talk to these people because they stay in power and you change all the time.

The greatest power is not money power, but political power.

In the sense that you're not at the centre of power, like a president or prime minister of a major power, everyone is marginalised; my position doesn't isn't unique in that respect. I think there are different sorts of relevance in different contexts.

Politics is the art of controlling your environment.

I've been dealing with politicians all my life. All my life. And I've always gotten them to do what I need them to do.

Real politics are the possession and distribution of power.

You must see the persons who are in charge - persons you can punish or vote for.

I think, people who remain in the political sphere as opposed to going into the private sector, really what they're looking at is how in some ways the compensation is power. How do you place a price tag on the ability to affect millions of people's lives? How do you place a price tag on the ability to determine the rules by which all of us play?